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What you should know about the PlayStation 4 Pro

16 May 2019

The PlayStation 4 Pro is the most powerful PS4 to date, but what does that really mean?

Released in November 2016, the PlayStation 4 Pro is a console built for those wanting the best PlayStation experience money can currently buy. The Pro comes with more powerful internal hardware than the base PS4, more system memory and is capable of running games at 4K resolutions - this is just under four times the 1080p a regular PS4 can deliver. And even if you don't own a 4K TV, the Pro uses a technique known as supersampling to improve the overall visual quality on 1080p TVs too.

Do PlayStation 4 games work on the PlayStation 4 Pro?

All games released for the regular PS4 will still work on the PS4 Pro, and some have even been patched to take advantage of the Pro's more-powerful hardware with better performance and enhanced visuals. This will continue as new games are released, too, with Sony promising all future games will be enhanced in some way on the PS4 Pro.

PlayStation 4 Pro and the Internet

The Internet is a requirement of gaming now, with patches and updates being a weekly norm for titles on release, as well as being an easier method of obtaining new DLC or additional content. While single-player games don’t generally require an Internet connection to play, you could be missing out critical patches or online features by not hooking your PS Pro up to wider Web. Other games like Destiny 2and The Division, meanwhile,require an Internet connection and a PlayStation Plus subscription to play at all.

Having an Internet connection on your PS4 Pro also allows for purchasing new games through the PlayStation Store from the comfort of your own home, immediately downloading and installing the game without having to even get up off the couch. Various apps on the store page can be installed, too, such as streaming services like Netflix and YouTube. These allow for a whole new level of entertainment from your console.

However, in order to play games online a PlayStation Plus subscription is required, but the added benefits make the small price of $10.95 a month well worth it.

Grab the 1TB PS4 Pro from Sony

What is PlayStation Plus?

PlayStation Plus is Sony's online subscription service that gets you access to a number of premium features such as playing multiplayer games online, cloud storage for game saves and discounts on games sold through the PlayStation Store. The membership can be purchased either monthly, every three months or yearly.

PS4 Pro Australian price

While the PS4 Slim has replaced the traditional PlayStation 4, the PS4 Pro is a fully-fledged upgrade and comes at a higher cost than the regular PS4 and the PS4 Slim.

If you want to save yourself some time and money then check out our comparison of the best PS4 Pro prices in Australia.

Unique features of the PS4 Pro

While the PS4 isn't drastically different from its Xbox counterpart, it does have a number of distinct features that help set it apart. The PS4 Pro has updated some of these features to match its more powerful hardware:

Remote Play in 1080p

Remote Play lets you stream your PS4's video output to a second screen over your home network or through the Internet. It effectively turns your Xperia smartphone or PlayStation Vita into both a screen and controller for your PS4. This is not limited to just your home or the vicinity around the PS4 either, as it leverage the Internet to allow you to go as remote as you like.

Thanks to the PS4 Pro, this feature is now able to support streaming in 1080p resolution to your remote device, allowing for a full experience on the go.

Share Play in 1080p

Share Play is a handy feature of the PS4 system, allowing others to play your games over the Internet to spectate or take over a game for you, even if they don’t own the game themselves. Nintendo had a feature like this originally on the DS and fans have always been fond of the opportunities it presents.

Thanks to the PS4 Pro, this feature is now able to share the game with friends online in 1080p resolution; this is an upgrade from the previous console.

You will need a PlayStation Plus subscription to make use of Share Play as it requires an Internet connection and active PSN account.

Enhanced Wi-Fi

The Pro sets out to fix one of the minor issues with the base PS4 – the old Wi-Fi adapter. Previously, speeds of only 2.4GHz wireless transmission with your router were possible, which could pose a big issue in households with significant network interference. The new chip in the Pro, which incorporates the 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac standard, allows the system to utilise the 5GHz frequency which is less prone to interference, making it easier for the Pro to take full advantage of your Internet speeds.

This new upgrade also allows you to choose from 2.4GHz and 5GHz modes to support your broadband speeds. This is important as some routers are only on a 2.4GHz band.

Additional USB space

An issue the PS4 had when the PSVR came out was the reliance on its USB slots: most users were already using a USB port for an external hard drive due to the small storage of the onboard 500GB hard drive, so the PSVR required the last remaining spot. This meant you weren’t able to charge the PS4 Dualshock controller while playing and were limited to the battery life when using the headset.

Thankfully, the PS4 Pro added an additional USB 3.0 port to the front, fixing this issue for the mean time. But it won’t be long until another accessory takes up that spot too and more ports are required.

4K and HDR

There are two big words in gaming at the moment – 4K and HDR (high dynamic range) – and understanding these two can mean a world of difference in your gaming experience. The PS4 Pro has both 4K and HDR under its belt, which means this console is at the forefront of visual technology.

4K is the upgraded version of the previous resolution of 1080p, which allows for more detail to be displayed on screen at once. This creates a crisper image with deeper details on displayed images. The PS4 Pro supports 4K streaming and upscales games to a 4k output, expanding the 1080p image to fit the resolution.

HDR, on the other hand, deals with colours and contrast, allowing for the details to be seen during darker or brighter scenes. The colours displayed match more closely with what we view in real life, and with the colours that were originally filmed. In darkness, layers of light are visible and the outlines can be seen. HDR-compatible TVs and games are needed to experience the high dynamic range on offer, but it is well worth it.

What is 4K?

The PlayStation 4 Pro is a console built for 4K resolution entertainment. 4K is a smidge less than four times the size of regular 1080p HD resolution. In order to achieve this level of detail, though, you'll need a 4K television and a device powerful enough to process 4K content.

However, rendering games in 4K requires a whole lot of power, and the PS4 Pro doesn't always render games in raw 4K. Instead, it uses a technique known as checkerboarding that takes a 1080p image and extrapolates each 2x2 block of pixels into a 4x4 block. This creates a pseudo-4K resolution and is a pretty neat trick. However, it is important to note that the Pro can offer a native 4K resolution for certain games, but it is just rarer than the system using the checkerboard process. Hopefully, as 4K console games become more mainstream, there will be more games taking advantage of the Pro’s native 4K capabilities.

Through applications on the home screen, the PS4 Pro is more than just a gaming console, it is a fully functioning entertainment system. With TV, movies, music, news, anime and an Internet browser ready to use, the PS4 Pro has everything to offer.While the PS4 Pro does not support 4K Blu-ray discs, it is able to stream 4K content through some of the entertainment apps. Netflix, Amazon Prime video and YouTube all allow for 4K streaming online; however, a 4K TV will be required to do so. If you do have a 4K TV, all you have to do is select the 4K resolution option in the settings of your preferred streaming application and check that the HDCP option is on, then you should be good to go!

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